Could the GOP be deliberately throwing the 2012 presidential election?

Sometimes I think so…hey anything’s possible but I really don’t actually think that’s how it is – I think there is a dearth of good candidates.

No, I don’t think so. They’re just so fractured though, that they can’t come up with a more centrist leader that gets support from the “base”. Their base is so out of touch with reality but they are the die-hard Repes.

Remember they cannibalized much of their long term leaders as part of the 2010 Tea Party take over of the party. To say it is a strategy of the party implies that they have a true hierarchy on the party. I think at its core, the republicans are in a state of anarchy with the dominant group shifting from week to week.

Oh, they’re serious. all right. Unfortunately, the Republicans don’t seem to be laughing as they rush to support these buffoons.

Did you miss the part of the movie where they deliberately trashed our credit rating?

@marinelife – they ARE the buffoons themselves. Sort of a self-help group.

@submariner
I think that Right Wingers live in their own little world. I think most do not comprehend reality. They do not care about America. Rhetoric controls them and documentation is beyond their comprehension. Many are very wealthy greedy people that never worked hard,some are brainwash uneducated fools. They are unreasoanble, narrow mined and self serving.
They are destroying the USA, giving our jobs,money, Technolgy and more to China.
I am an Independent and the Demorcrates also favor the weathy over the Middle Class.
They may give the Nomination to Gingrich because they are foolish and unable to recongize how evil he is. He will push people too far. This will be mean protest and I pray it does not come to this.
I have wealthy educated family that think like these worthless people. Many are well educated morons that believe they are entitled. That everyone who is not wealthy should work until they die.

It’s not a completely ridiculous assumption. If you’ll recall the run-up to the 1992 election, no one in 1991 (the buildup to war year, starting in August with “This will not stand”) – to his utter triumph over Saddam in early 1992, and the huge bump in approval ratings – expected to be able to touch the incumbent in the general election. He appeared to be unassailable. I believe many better-known candidates did only token “exploratory bids” at the presidency, which is how we ended up with the Governor of Arkansas running for the office.

Months later, after some incredibly inept maneuvers on Bush’s part, we had “the sacrificial Democrat” as a two-term (and quite popular) president. Don’t be surprised to see that happen again. I don’t see any way that Obama can overcome his current unpopularity – unless he starts shootin’ at someone himself. And don’t be surprised to see that, either.

Welcome to BizzaroWorld. Everything is upside down and backwards.

I don’t think so. The Republicans/Tea Party members are very determined to wrest the Presidency away from Obama. I have no idea who they will nominate as their candidate, although to me Ron Paul is the least objectionable – but he is not rabid enough to generate the support that he would need to cinch the nomination. The Republicans are so determined, & seem so implacable, & so self-righteous, & so disrespectful & condescending to anyone who is not Republican….. that it truly worries me that a Republican might well get elected as our next President.

Maybe, just maybe (probably not, but maybe), the idea is to have all the crazy extremists run right now, while it doesn’t really matter, and pander to that base. Then, when they all fail, and there’s no chance of any of them winning against Obama, the Republican Party puts in a more moderate candidate, and even though the extreme factions aren’t thrilled with him/her, everyone sees it as their only option against Obama and throws weight under the moderate candidate.

I can think of two quotes here; one to answer the question, and one as a reply to @zenvelo.

“Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.” – Hanlon’s Razor, a mantra I recite to myself daily in order to avoid becoming paranoid.

”I belong to no organized party. I am a Democrat.” – Will Rogers
Proof that the Republicans have finally arrived at where the Democrats have been for over a century.

I will let y’all decide which is which ;)

It would be nice to think so, but I doubt it. My husband’s idea (he’s nominally a Republican) is that Sarah Palin is going to step in and “save the day” after all the other choices have self-destructed. He doesn’t think it will work, mind you, just thinks that might be the plan.

@jerv Having been frustrated for decades at the Democrats inability to work together to get something done or put up decent candidates, (Dukakis? really?), it just seems more confounding that the Republicans are in disarray too.

@zenvelo I am cynical enough to have no trouble understanding that people are chaotic. I am confounded by how they kept themselves together so long.

Thanks, all. I know the question is far-fetched, and I don’t normally go in for this tinfoil-hat stuff, but the silly season seems sillier than usual this year, so I’ve responded with some silly speculation of my own.

Maybe the simplest explanation is that the strongest GOP hopefuls have recognized that Obama has a better shot at re-election than polls suggest, and have decided to wait until 2016, when there will be no incumbent, and Joe Biden probably won’t run.

jerv, I may have to write Hanlon’s Razor on a poster and put it on my wall.

@submariner The British paraphrase it nicely; “Cockup before conspiracy”.